Aceh waria piece

Her hair is wavy, swept to the side and dyed a sort of strawberry blonde. She has tight fitting black singlet and she’s tastefully made up. Looking confident, if not sassy, her appearance in the photo is sharp contrast to the reverse ball cap and moustache she awkwardly sports now.

Monica hands me her phone to show me a selfie that she keeps as proof of a former life that ended abruptly in January.

Her hair is wavy, swept to the side and dyed a sort of strawberry blonde. She has tight fitting black singlet and she’s tastefully made up. Looking confident, if not sassy, her appearance in the photo is sharp contrast to the reverse ball cap and moustache she awkwardly sports now.

In late January, Monica, was a one of 11 transgendered women, whom police rounded up (https://www.hrw.org/news/2018/01/30/indonesian-police-arrest-transgender-women)in a series of raids on salons amid a crackdown on local transgendered women, or waria as they are known here.

Monica says she was beaten and her head shaved in front of onlookers. Police then took the captives to prison, where they were treated to a sort of reverse finishing school of push ups, shouting and marches that officers reckoned would man them up.

The nightmare didn’t end there.On her return home, Monica, the youngest of five was beaten and locked in her room by her older brother following saturated media coverage of her arrest. Now living in Jakarta, she can only talk briefly about her ordeal before asking to stop.

“It’s too traumatic,” she says.

“Everyday I’m very confused. I live in other people’s worldand have no power.”

The ritual humiliation of Indonesia’s gay lesbian and transgendered citizens is accelerating. Where once it was the subject of bizarre ejaculations of cabinet ministers and police raids on gay saunas, now the discrimination and harassment is so well worn it has morphed into commonsense.

In February police in the Jakarta suburb of Depok breezily reported that officers had been monitoring a lesbian couple (http://wartakota.tribunnews.com/2018/02/27/pasangan-lesbian-di-pancoran-mas-depok-diobservasi-satpol-pp-depok )after they had moved into the area four months earlier.YayanArianto, the local deputy police chief said his officers were acting on complaints fromneighbourswho were uncomfortable with their presence.

"Some residents, who live near the couple have said they are uncomfortable with them there because the way they live is not in accordance with the norms that exist in our society," the report quotesYayan as saying. The report went on to give the names, ages and address of the women, who sell rose water for use in funerals.

Monica’s experience and that of the women in Depok illustrate what Indonesia’s anti-gay bigotry mean for its LGBT citizens. Their risk is less about physical and legal peril, although that is not insignificant, but more about dislocation and marginalization and all that means for their income and quality of life.

Activists in Aceh interviewed by Human Rights Watch estimate there are upwards of 700 waria working in salons in Aceh. These women are unable to work without fear of harassment or arrest. Their clients also face legal problems.

On March 12 a transgendered stylist and her male customer were arrested and charged with violating the province’s anti gay ordinances adopted in 2014 (https://www.merdeka.com/peristiwa/gerebek-salon-warga-banda-aceh-amankan-waria-dan-pria-berduaan-dalam-kamar.html). Evidence included condoms found on the premises and, oddly, Rp100,000 (US$7.30) in “transaction money”.

Another gay couple in Aceh, this time university students, was seized by vigilantes (https://www.jawapos.com/read/2018/03/29/200013/dua-pria-diduga-pasangan-gay-digerebek-warga-saat-berduaan) and taken to police late last month (evidence included more condoms, and – disconcertingly -- a mattress).

Aceh adopted a form of sharia law in 2014. In May last year a young gay couple were flogged in front of hundreds in what is thought to be Asia’s first public beating of homosexuals since colonial times.

To make ends meet Monica is now working in a clothing shop run by a company called SriKendes (https://www.instagram.com/srikendes/?hl=en), which donates most of its proceeds to help survivors of domestic and sexual abuse. She’s training twice a week to become a stylist and beautician and from time to time gets some counseling.SriKendes supports seven waria who have escaped from Aceh and now live in Medan and Jakarta.

Monica insists on her feminine name, which is just as well because despite the makings of a young man’s moustache, frankly, she isn’t fooling anyone. A hand will fly up to her mouth to hide a laugh, which amazingly still happens.

The dream seeing her through all this, Monica says, is to open a salon of her own. It’s in the distance to be sure. More immediate concerns are her health. She’s clearly anxious, she’s got a persistent dry cough and she’s lost weight recently. I notice the backwards ball cap and tease her gently about how butch she looks. Her brother gave her the cap; stylish, black with a metallic sheen. It’s from the trendy brand Equal. The label is emblazed on the front. Monica doesn’t know what the English word means. I explain it to her and she agrees the cap takes on new significance.

Latest Posts

About me

Regular strings include Forbes Media, the Business Times of Singapore and the Economist Group.
My start in journalism dates back to Tokyo in 2000 at Bloomberg News. Five years later I moved to Sydney where I worked at Fairfax publications including the Australian Financial Review. Life as a foreign correspondent beckoned, however.